Titan 1024 (TITA1024.WAD)

It feels like a long time ago but, back in 2014, the author of the Titan series pointed me toward his then recent entry: Titan 1024, a sort of re-imagining of the then ten-year old levels within the 1024 limit. I said that I would do one better and play both the original as well as Titan 2 before checking out TITA1024. Well, after six and a half years, here we are! Sorry for the wait, Ixnatifual. Titan 1024 is a ten-level episode for Doom II to be played in GZDoom. It was originally released in 2012, some three and a half years after his last publication. The author notes that jumping is acceptable, but crouching is forbidden. The number of situations where the former comes up is... not big, but try not to forget that it's an option.

Russian Overkill (RO_PB_2.5.PK3)

RUSSIAN OVERKILL

by "Pillowblaster"

Gameplay mods are wicked cool things. I don't use them when I play PWADs for review because I prefer to explore the way in which authors balanced their levels. There is something cathartic, though, in blowing through super-tough mapsets that consumed hours of my life (e.g. Sunlust) with a heinously overpowered weapons mod. Enter Russian Overkill. This GZDoom institution was originally released in 2011 and saw several feature updates until 2013, after which it undergoes the occasional under-the-hood retuning. Pillowblaster received 2012's Best Gameplay Mod Cacoward due in part to the convergence of two community developments as well as the mod's specific style.

Suteni (SUTENI.WAD)

SUTENI

by "Memfis" and Aleks Shahov aka "Plut"

Memfis has had a long and obscenely productive authorial career. 2011-2012 was a sort of warming-up period, followed by an even more prolific string of ideas in 2013-2015. Suteni isn't the last of his '12 period - that honor belongs to Horalky - but it wasn't uploaded into 2014, part of a huge dump to /idgames. Of all his early releases it's distinct for being a tag team feature. I dunno what sort of relationship Memfis and Plut had back in 2012 but they appear to share some similar interests. After all, they both cameoed in the French community's 3 Heures d'Agonie II. On this particular occasion they collaborated to produce a MAP01 replacement for Doom II that affirms compatibility with limit-removing ports.

Overheat (OVERHEA1.WAD)

OVERHEAT

by "Memfis"

Memfis has tried on a variety of different WAD themes. Some of them, like ICARUMEM and RELIVEX2, were explicitly based on classic-era releases if not in the absolute content then the texture schemes represented in them. Others e.g. Kurogane are more vanilla but each one tends to have its own little twist. Overheat was originally published to the Doomworld forums in 2012 but, like so many other things by Memfis, only found its way to /idgames in mid-2014. It's a MAP01 replacement for Doom II and is theoretically vanilla-compatible but an engine bug restricts it to limit-removing ports that have squashed the "Medusa" effect.

Tayutayu (TAYUTAYU.WAD)

In my review of ICARUMEM I mentioned the idea of further galactic adventures in the vein of Memfis's MEM_OLD1. Tayutayu may not use the Icarus: Alien Vanguard texture set but it is another level on an interstellar station which makes it pretty cool in my book. Like his old space base it's also for the original Doom, occupying E1M1 and E1M2. This minisode was explicitly tested in PrBoom-plus but the parameters suggest that it ought to work just fine in any limit-removing source port. It was soft-released to various forums in early 2012 but was not uploaded until his great archive dump of 2014.

Menkui (MENKUI.WAD)

MENKUI

by "Memfis"

If you've been following along then the fact that this level showcases textures from 2002: A Doom Odyssey should not come as a surprise. I've seen Memfis as an outspoken fan of 2002ADO and even surmised in my review of Beware of False Prophets that he might have tributed it at some point. This PWAD is right in line with an MO established in Requimem and then continued in MEM_OLD1, MM2MEM01, Relive X2, and ICARUMEM. I just hadn't guessed at this one because - as he admits - Memfis grabbed its title from a hentai manga. Menkui is an E4M1 replacement originally released in 2012 but not uploaded until 2014 and should play back in any source port.

icarumem (ICARUMEM.WAD)

ICARUMEM

by "Memfis"

Requiem, Memento Mori II, Phobos - Relive the Nightmare... and then Icarus: Alien Vanguard. It would be neat to see Memfis continue to check boxes of classic-era megaWADs after experimenting with their resources. It's something that I've actually thought of doing. Until then, here's icarumem. This one was published to the Doomworld Forums in early 2012 but, again, didn't make it to the /idgames archives until the 2014 June powerdump. It requires the actual ICARUS.WAD since it's used as a texture resource and should work with essentially all limit-removing source ports. Apart from the PWAD dependency it's also important to note that icarumem occupies the MAP24 slot of Doom II. It isn't thematically linked with "The Haunting". The author presumably enjoyed its slot's track, "Ghost In the Machine".

Doom the Way id Did: The Lost Episodes (DTWID-LE.WAD)

Doom the Way id Did generated a ton of buzz in the community, who turned out to craft approximately 100 submissions. The only event that I know to have surpassed it - as far as single-player levels go - is the 10 Sectors contest. It has also enjoyed a number of spinoffs during its lifespan, including the long-lived but recently finalized Ultimate DTWiD. It's crazy to think that a handful of levels went on to form the foundation of No End In Sight, something like an 850% increase in volume. All of Callum Guy Oliver's entries were gathered together in their own package, PhobosDeimos Anomaly, in a posthumous tribute. A few even saw solo releases. The lion's share of the "rejects" were published as a gargantuan collection dubbed The Lost Episodes. DTWID-LE saw a beta release in 2012 but thereafter entered a drawn-out polishing phase where a few new maps were made or substantially changed. It didn't see its first iteration on /idgames until 2016.

Relive X2 (RELIVEX2.WAD)

Memfis loves classic PWADs. If they're relatively obscure, then even better. Shamus Young made a couple of things that he really enjoyed though the Doom City tribute wouldn't come until 2013 as a part of his Kuchitsu. RELIVEX2 is his little love letter to Phobos - Relive the Nightmare, a Doom II episode that drew inspiration from the names of Knee Deep in the Dead's maps. This couplet - originally released in 2012 - is a limit-removing minisode which occupies MAP01 and MAP02. It doesn't require Shamus's PWAD as a resource since it incorporated all of the relevant assets. The author forgot something along the way, though, because MAP02 references textures which aren't included.

Horalky (HORALKY.WAD)

HORALKY
by "Memfis"

In my mind the Russian Doom Community is perhaps the most tightly knit of all the idtech1 diaspora. Looking back through their history I see tons of little mapping competitions and many of these had their entries included in larger projects like Heroes' Tales or Whitemare. Horalky originated as a prospective submission to a "Grid 64 Contest" but Memfis didn't finish it in time. I'm not sure whether the project ever saw completion. At least, it doesn't look like it was uploaded to /idgames and I'm not willing to spend my time researching its fate on iddqd.ru. We have this, though. It's a MAP01 replacement and should work in any limit-removing port.

Kukuku (KUKUKU.WAD)

KUKUKU

by "Memfis"

2012 wasn't as big a year for Memfis as the previous one as far as solo releases went but he did manage to squeeze out a few. Kukuku is the second of his uploads from 2012. It's a single level for the original Doom which is technically similar to the previous Beware of False Prophets. The latter is an enormous E4-style map, though, where this E1M1 replacement is better-primed to kick off a more or less traditional Knee Deep in the Dead episode. The title actually has a citation this time and is explicitly mentioned as being the catchphrase of a thirteen-year-old anime girl. I doubt whether it directly informed the construction of the level.

Beware of False Prophets (BOFP.WAD)

BEWARE OF FALSE PROPHETS

by "Memfis"

I'm not sure how Memfis feels about Paul Corfiatis's Doom II levels and I'm too lazy to ask him while I write this but based on what I've read regarding 2002: A Doom Odyssey I think it's safe to say that he's a fan of pcorf's episodic stuff. It wouldn't surprise me if he'd made a level inspired by 2002: ADO or, say, the trilogy of Thy Flesh Consumed tributes known as the Death Tormention series. In fact, that's a pretty good description of Beware of False Prophets, Memfis's first solo release of 2012 as well as an E4M1 replacement meant for play in limit-removing ports.

Castle of the Hengs (CASTHENG.WAD)

Back when I started playing Doom again I had a bunch of review sites bookmarked with the express intent of finding obscure but memorable stuff on the larger end of the scale. One of these was Geniac's Doom WAD Playlist. The descriptions aren't very thorough but they give you a brief picture. One of the interesting PWADs that I wasn't able to locate on the archive was CASTHENG by "James XIII". Back when the entry was made it was logged as consisting of fourteen "tough scary castle levels". After I sent out a feeler in 2012 in the "Trying to Find a Specific WAD" thread on Doomworld, The Mad Butcher delivered and provided me with a copy. I was surprised to discover that Castle of the Hengs had been further developed to the point of replacing MAP01-MAP30 of Doom II.

MAYhem 2012 (MAYHEM12.WAD)

The good news is that TheMionicDonut's MAYhem became an annual institution where mapsets - sometimes a megaWAD's worth - are created. The unfortunate news is that its completion / polishing phase inevitably runs over the monthly time frame. MAYHEM12, for instance, saw its final release in November of the same year while MAYhem 2013 hung around until March of 2014. It isn't much bad news at all, though, especially considering how long projects usually languish on hard drives. The community still gets a brand new collection of levels to play and the contributing authors get to flex their muscles in a theme that they might not have otherwise experimented with. In this case it's twelve Boom-compatible levels for Doom II.

Doom 2 Minor Sprite Fixing Project (SPRFIX19.ZIP)

DOOM 2 MINOR

SPRITE FIXING

PROJECT

by "Revenant100"

id kickstarted a legendary legacy of user-created content, all built on a set of rock solid assets. Plenty of people not satisfied with Doom's lo-res aesthetic have tried their hand at trying to re-make the textures and sprites to something more pleasing to them, with the latter typically resulting in unintentionally hilarious 3D models or painstakingly smudged upscales. I initially thought the original look to be pixel perfect but over the years I've noticed a handful of imperfections only to simply accept them as the quirks of doing business. Enter the Doom 2 Minor Sprite Fixing Project, a deep dive of the base resources. Revenant100 corrects these very issues as well as a host of things that casual - perhaps MOST - players have probably never noticed.

Firetop Mountain (FTMTN_V2.ZIP)

FIRETOP MOUNTAIN
by Glen "glenzinho" McColl

The Fighting Fantasy series of books were a British innovation from the two dudes that founded Games Workshop, primarily responsible for WarHams as well as my favorite tabletop game of all time, HeroQuest. The works were choose-your-own adventure books but they also folded in pen and paper RPG elements for a more interactive experience. The Warlock of Firetop Mountain was the first of these volumes and it inspired a young glenzinho enough to make a single level for Doom II. The end product is a MAP01 replacement for GZDoom but it's a very big adventure with a monster count that swells as a result of scripted spawns.

Unhinged (UNHINGED.WAD)

UNHINGED
by "darsycho"

Back in 2012, the dude who would become darsycho made a pretty weird but goofy Doom mod by the name of Beyond Reality. I liked it; some of the spots were off-the-wall but it was more about being silly than weirding the player out. Then, toward the tail end of the same year, he published another surreal Doom mod but with a very different atmosphere. Enter: Unhinged. On its face it's a two-map offering for Doom II to be played in the ZDoom family of ports with the second map purely existing for the end sequence. The initial impression - a lonely stretch of urban road built from vanilla Doom II textures with some Duke3D stuff for building facades - is underwhelming. But there's more.

The Core (A_CORE.WAD)

THE CORE
by "zrrion the insect"

zrrion built up a nice little portfolio in 2012, paving the way toward his eventual inclusion as one of the guiding forces behind the ZDoom Community Map Project Take Two. After exploding with a big ol' Realm 667 showcase in The Void of Hell, he followed up with a more muted showing in The Blood of Virgins, which used GZDoom to enhance what would otherwise be - I think - a traditional experience. The Core is, then, a more substantial experience, a larger level with about three times as many monsters to chew through. Like its predecessors, it was released in 2012 and targeted GZDoom. The pacing and layout leave it with a feeling more akin to adventure maps, though, than anything that has come before.

The Blood of Virgins (V_BLOOD.WAD)

THE BLOOD OF VIRGINS
by "zrrion the insect"

zrrion's first major release was a sort of minisode adventure in the black void between worlds - The Void of Hell. It wasn't the only thing he did in 2012, though. The Blood of Virgins is in many respects a more traditional experience when compared to the mini-TC feel of HVOID. It's also a single level, apparently inspired by a song by Swedish Doom Metal band, Candlemass - "A Sorcerer's Pledge". As with pretty much anything else the dude has done, you'll need to play it back in GZDoom, though most of this level's geometry wouldn't be out of place in ZDoom.

The Void of Hell (HVOID.WAD)

zrrion has built up something of a reputation as a minor GZDoom sensation. Here he is, just starting out, with this little minisode for Doom II titled The Void of Hell, released in 2012. Apparently, this set owes its existence to ZPack; or, rather, ZPack's failure to embody the sort of black Hell of zrrion's own imagination. Embracing the principles of DIY, he decided to render his nightmare in his own image. The Void of Hell is actually pretty short as far as map packs go, consisting of two normal levels, a boss map, and a silly secret that involves, among other things, a Dalek. It also has its own story.